The 80th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was last week. We were taught this atrocity was necessary to end the war and we believed it.
It was a Trump-style lie. The Japanese military was on its knees and within days of surrendering. It was mass murder of 200,000 innocent civilians, to test the lethality of the very different ‘Little Boy’ and ‘Fat Man’ atomic bombs.
A preferred target was the ancient capital Kyoto, with 1,600 temples, some dating back over a thousand years. Secretary of War, Henry Stimson, persuaded President Truman such loss of cultural and historical heritage could hinder postwar reconciliation efforts.
That massacre of civilians was a war crime
That massacre of civilians was a war crime. What is happening in Gaza is a war crime.
Japanese people protested the Gaza genocide near the Atomic Bomb Dome in Hiroshima last week, coinciding with the ceremony commemorating bomb victims.
Premier Minns’ attempt to halt the bridge March for Humanity was thwarted by Justice Belinda Rigg who declared, ‘…the march at this location is motivated by the belief that the horror and urgency of the situation in Gaza demands an urgent and extraordinary response from the people of the world…’
Hundreds of thousands who braved the bitter weather and marched proved her right.
Minns’ own colleagues called his prohibition attempt ‘risible’. He is out of touch with the mood of the people.
Weapons of mass destruction
This march was reminiscent of the huge one against the Iraq war in 2003.
Once again, the people were right. That war was trumped up on the false premise that Iraq had ‘weapons of mass destruction’. They didn’t.
Thirty-one countries joined President Bush’s ‘Coalition of the Willing’. France, Canada and Germany refused and were vilified. Australia should never have participated, but meekly joined in, as we have in most American military misadventures since WWII. That must now change.
Politicians ignore public opinion at their peril. There’s seething discontent in many countries.
Governments of the UK, America and Australia are out of sync with their people.
UK PM Keir Starmer is too conservative, and his polls are plummeting. The drop is the largest of any newly-elected government in 40 years.
Labour is polling just above 20 per cent, down 15 per cent from a year ago. Older voters are fleeing to radical Reform UK, young voters to the Greens. If an election were held today, neither Labour nor Conservatives would win.
Disillusionment with the two old parties
Disillusionment with the two old parties was demonstrated in a startling way when former UK Labour leader, and now independent, Jeremy Corbyn and Labour MP Zarah Sultana announced in July, they were setting up a new party to ‘take on the rich and powerful’, currently called Your Party. Within days 500,000 had signed up. A revolutionary new movement is born.
In America, disillusionment has set in. MAGA is in disarray over the betrayal they feel on the Epstein cover-up. High-profile radical Marjorie Taylor Greene has turned on the GOP for abandoning MAGA. If Trump thinks his futile meeting with Putin in Alaska, minus Zelensky, will divert attention away from the Epstein scandal, he’s mistaken.
ICE goons seizing people off the streets
ICE goons seizing people off the streets and workplaces and imprisoning them has caused a furore across the country. Republican members of Congress hardly dare hold town hall meetings as they are howled down by angry constituents.
A recent poll showed independent Bernie Sanders, regarded as a left-wing radical, is at the centre of the US political spectrum, while both Democrats and Republicans are seen as too far to the right.
Sanders and Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez drew gigantic crowds on their recent ‘Fighting Oligarchy’ tour, tapping into resentment felt by so many Americans having difficulty affording groceries and healthcare, while billionaires get tax cuts. America is now heading into a dismal period of ‘stagflation’, as tariffs raise prices and the economy stagnates.
The growing climate catastrophe
Add to this the global chaos caused by the growing climate catastrophe, of which the Byron Writers Festival was just another victim.
In Australia, the current impasse after the Tasmanian election illustrates growing disillusionment with the two old parties. The fair Hare-Clark electoral system has resulted in Liberals having 14 seats, Labor 10 and Greens and independents 11. Conservative Labor leader Dean Winter is loath to do a deal with the Greens that would guarantee him government. Will he cave in?
Anthony Albanese has a huge majority, thanks to Greens preferences and teals taking the Liberal heartland. That could change in one election if the wishes of the people are ignored, as is happening in the UK.
Albo needs to listen and act fearlessly. That means scrapping AUKUS, repairing the capital gains tax and increasing taxes on the mega wealthy.
The people are finding their feet and voices, and will not be taken for granted.
As the revolutionary chant goes, ‘The people united will never be defeated’.
Richard Jones is a former NSW MLC and is now a ceramicist.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
